Friday, January 28, 2011
Am I the only atheist who doesn't care if religious people don't want to date me?
Look.. if someone didn't want to date black people because they were black or a bi person because they were bi that's one thing.. you're discriminating based on how the person was born. If you refuse to date a black person even if you love everything else about them, love their personality and find them attractive.. then you're just racist. If you don't want to date someone who has a fundamentally different system of beliefs and ethics which is incredibly important to you.. then of course you want to find someone with similar views! Some people don't mind- they don't tend to be the activist sort... but if you don't want to date a bigot because their ethics are fundamentally different from yours then that's fine! (of course the bigot is usually the religious person not the atheist, but it's just for making a point). If being for women's rights is incredibly important to you then who would blame you for not dating a misogynist? If animal rights if your thing then who could blame you for not dating a hunter? All of these things go in the other direction too.. i'm sure a hunter wouldn't want to date an animal rights activist.. that's completely understandable. Relationships are hard enough without having to deal with a person's beliefs which cause you emotional turmoil. I don't get the big deal or why atheists tend to complain that religious people won't date them... deep seated personality conflicts probably means it wouldn't work out anyway. Find someone more apathetic if you are as well or find someone with whom you mesh on basic ethics and beliefs.
Monday, January 24, 2011
Traveling Vegan- a rough trip to PA
We weren't expecting to have to leave town. I was getting ready to go see a friend whom I hadn't seen for years and then, the next day, to head to a meetup with a local vegan group at the best (and only) vegetarian/vegan restaurant in town. A busy but nice weekend. Then, Friday, my husband emailed me from work. His grandfather had had a heart attack and it was bad enough that we had to go up immediately. Open heart surgery was too risky and all 3 of his valves were blocked. Even now only one is working. We only had a couple of hours to get ready before bed including explaining to our four and a half year old why we were leaving suddenly.
The trip up was long and the only suitable meal for lunch consisted of french fries. Not only do people not realize that vegans exist, but they don't seem to have any idea that food exists that isn't slathered in some kind of awful, unhealthy, animal part. Not that fries are all that healthy.. but they were the only option. Part of it was the timing.. we could have stopped in Hagerstown, MD at a veg cafe, but we needed to get into town before visiting hours were over. I had baked a cake the night before since my sister in law wanted to take my son to a birthday party so that my husband and I could go to the hospital since children weren't allowed. After our visit to see his grandpa we headed back to the birthday party and realized our poor baby couldn't even drink the punch because they put sherbet in it (with milk). He did really well with asking what he could eat and if it was vegan though. I did explain to him that he couldn't eat anything but what we gave him and he understood. Even with it being a last minute thing that I couldn't plan well for, he had a really great time with the other kids.
As well as I get along with my inlaws, I have to say.. it's incredibly stressful being surrounded by non vegans. People who don't get you, who don't get your ethical choices, and treat you like an oddity. Though the adults were pretty used to it, the kids nick named my child "vegan" (original, I know). While my son thought it was fine and was even proud of the badge, I worry that in the future this effect of being singled out just for loving animals will become an issue. I know that some people at this point say it's bad parenting for making your child different enough to be picked on (he actually hasn't been yet), but they usually fail to realize that doing the right thing sometimes has consequences.. for example, if we lived in a racist or homophobic area I would encourage him to stand up for those civil rights- even if it meant he got picked on.. because letting him be a bigot or letting him watch others get hurt? Just not an option. The fault lies with the bullies and their parents, not in the child who isn't a cookie cutter copy of every other child.
Chambersburg, PA is a dairy town. Smiling cows look down from barns and silos. They're a mix of pasture roaming animals and fenced animals though all of them look somewhat sad, sickly, and thin. We really wanted to take our son to meet some of the cows and see them up close.. just so that he could connect with the animals and have a more personal feeling of ethical obligation to them. To show him- look.. this is the animal and this is why we don't abuse it.
There was almost no place to eat in town but his family insisted we get take out and eat together so we had to get Chinese (the only option unless we wanted fries again). Veggie fried rice and tofu- though the sauce for the tofu was rather bland. Luckily we stopped at a store and got some oatmeal for breakfast and we'd packed our own food to bring from home. Makings for a vegan pizza with daiya, a half of a celebration roast, some vegan cheese slices, and half a pack of veggie dogs. A lot of processed foods all at once, but we knew we wouldn't have time for much else . I want to stress that it wasn't hard. You know.. being vegan and traveling? It would have been much easier with more planning (and more time) but we made due even on short notice. And there were plenty of grocery stores with fresh fruits and veggies and even vegan junk food... but I do want to point out how very unfriendly society is towards vegans- or really towards health in general. If we stressed health in this country (we like to stress thinness, wealth, and status.. but certainly not health) there would be a lot more vegan options just by default.
My mother in law was planning a get together for the playoff game and kept asking me to come to the kitchen to talk to her. She didn't realize that I kept leaving the kitchen because the smell of the raw chicken was making me absolutely sick. Even being a hardcore 'in your face' vegan I didn't want to completely piss her off in her own home- especially since we were there for a sick relative. I kept trying to covertly cover my nose or conveniently follow the kids into the other room. If you've been away from raw meat for a while and you finally smell it again- it's really incredibly disgusting and sickening. That's completely separate from any ethical parts of the situation.. the smell really is just unbearable. For veg's who live with omnivores I would guess they're used to it.. but it's been a couple of years since I had to live in the same house with an omni. I realize I have an especially sensitive sense of smell and a sensitive stomach to boot so I hope the rest of you don't have the same issues.
And, finally, we tried to talk to them about a vegan diet- we know they'd never adopt the lifestyle or do it for ethical reasons.. but I think when you're dying it may be a good time to re evaluate your stubbornness on eating unhealthy foods. Considering a vegan diet may actually reverse heart disease it would have been pretty irresponsible of us to not try to push it. After all... Pappy is in heart failure. Honestly... I'm not sure there's enough time for it to help... but it might.. and it's as good a chance as any right now.. I don't want out next trip to be a funeral...
Overall the trip was stressful.. and I mean stressful on top of the original stress of a sick family member. It's hard seeing and hearing about cruelty.. it makes you unbearably sad and frustrated. Doing the right thing isn't always easy.
The trip up was long and the only suitable meal for lunch consisted of french fries. Not only do people not realize that vegans exist, but they don't seem to have any idea that food exists that isn't slathered in some kind of awful, unhealthy, animal part. Not that fries are all that healthy.. but they were the only option. Part of it was the timing.. we could have stopped in Hagerstown, MD at a veg cafe, but we needed to get into town before visiting hours were over. I had baked a cake the night before since my sister in law wanted to take my son to a birthday party so that my husband and I could go to the hospital since children weren't allowed. After our visit to see his grandpa we headed back to the birthday party and realized our poor baby couldn't even drink the punch because they put sherbet in it (with milk). He did really well with asking what he could eat and if it was vegan though. I did explain to him that he couldn't eat anything but what we gave him and he understood. Even with it being a last minute thing that I couldn't plan well for, he had a really great time with the other kids.
As well as I get along with my inlaws, I have to say.. it's incredibly stressful being surrounded by non vegans. People who don't get you, who don't get your ethical choices, and treat you like an oddity. Though the adults were pretty used to it, the kids nick named my child "vegan" (original, I know). While my son thought it was fine and was even proud of the badge, I worry that in the future this effect of being singled out just for loving animals will become an issue. I know that some people at this point say it's bad parenting for making your child different enough to be picked on (he actually hasn't been yet), but they usually fail to realize that doing the right thing sometimes has consequences.. for example, if we lived in a racist or homophobic area I would encourage him to stand up for those civil rights- even if it meant he got picked on.. because letting him be a bigot or letting him watch others get hurt? Just not an option. The fault lies with the bullies and their parents, not in the child who isn't a cookie cutter copy of every other child.
Chambersburg, PA is a dairy town. Smiling cows look down from barns and silos. They're a mix of pasture roaming animals and fenced animals though all of them look somewhat sad, sickly, and thin. We really wanted to take our son to meet some of the cows and see them up close.. just so that he could connect with the animals and have a more personal feeling of ethical obligation to them. To show him- look.. this is the animal and this is why we don't abuse it.
There was almost no place to eat in town but his family insisted we get take out and eat together so we had to get Chinese (the only option unless we wanted fries again). Veggie fried rice and tofu- though the sauce for the tofu was rather bland. Luckily we stopped at a store and got some oatmeal for breakfast and we'd packed our own food to bring from home. Makings for a vegan pizza with daiya, a half of a celebration roast, some vegan cheese slices, and half a pack of veggie dogs. A lot of processed foods all at once, but we knew we wouldn't have time for much else . I want to stress that it wasn't hard. You know.. being vegan and traveling? It would have been much easier with more planning (and more time) but we made due even on short notice. And there were plenty of grocery stores with fresh fruits and veggies and even vegan junk food... but I do want to point out how very unfriendly society is towards vegans- or really towards health in general. If we stressed health in this country (we like to stress thinness, wealth, and status.. but certainly not health) there would be a lot more vegan options just by default.
My mother in law was planning a get together for the playoff game and kept asking me to come to the kitchen to talk to her. She didn't realize that I kept leaving the kitchen because the smell of the raw chicken was making me absolutely sick. Even being a hardcore 'in your face' vegan I didn't want to completely piss her off in her own home- especially since we were there for a sick relative. I kept trying to covertly cover my nose or conveniently follow the kids into the other room. If you've been away from raw meat for a while and you finally smell it again- it's really incredibly disgusting and sickening. That's completely separate from any ethical parts of the situation.. the smell really is just unbearable. For veg's who live with omnivores I would guess they're used to it.. but it's been a couple of years since I had to live in the same house with an omni. I realize I have an especially sensitive sense of smell and a sensitive stomach to boot so I hope the rest of you don't have the same issues.
And, finally, we tried to talk to them about a vegan diet- we know they'd never adopt the lifestyle or do it for ethical reasons.. but I think when you're dying it may be a good time to re evaluate your stubbornness on eating unhealthy foods. Considering a vegan diet may actually reverse heart disease it would have been pretty irresponsible of us to not try to push it. After all... Pappy is in heart failure. Honestly... I'm not sure there's enough time for it to help... but it might.. and it's as good a chance as any right now.. I don't want out next trip to be a funeral...
Overall the trip was stressful.. and I mean stressful on top of the original stress of a sick family member. It's hard seeing and hearing about cruelty.. it makes you unbearably sad and frustrated. Doing the right thing isn't always easy.
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